It's eight o'clock on Wednesday the twenty-seventh of February.

The city regulator has said that loans will never be as cheap as they were before the recent financial crisis.

Homes in Lincolnshire have been damaged by an earthquake which was felt across much of England and Wales this morning.

Ministers are planning to withdraw benefits from drug users who drop out of treatment programmes.

The head of the City regulator is predicting that cheap loans could be a thing of the past. Hector Sants -- of the Financial Services Authority -- believes that bankers have been forced to respond to the problems stemming from America, where mortgages were offered to people who could not afford them. He's told the BBC that he expects banks to turn against the elaborate financial instruments they developed in order to make credit more easily available. Here's our business editor, Robert Peston:

PESTON: Regulators aren't always right -- but the firms they regulate have to listen to them. So when the chief executive of the Financial Services Authority says that banking markets will never return to the way they were before last summer's crisis, well that matters. What does he mean? That banks will no longer be able to sell off their loans to international investors as cheaply as they were doing or on the scale that they were doing. Banks will, he says, revert to being more like the lenders we used to know. They'll get to know their customers better and forge longer term relationships with borrowers. Most of us would probably see that as a positive development. But there will be less cheap credit available for all of us, not just for a few months, but, in the view of Hector Sants, for ever. He thinks that's probably a good thing, in that we'll have less incentive to borrow too much, but the process of adjustment to a world where money is more expensive will not be painless.

People across much of England and Wales were rocked by an earthquake at around one o'clock this morning. A man from South Yorkshire was injured when the chimney of his house crashed through his bedroom ceiling. The British Geological Survey says the epicentre of the quake was near Market Rasen in Lincolnshire -- Sarah Sturdey is there:

STURDEY: With a magnitude of five-point-two, it's the largest earthquake in the UK in almost a quarter of a century. Residents at the epicentre in Market Rasen, describe being woken up by a loud terrifying rumbling sound. As buildings shook, people ran into the streets, unsure of what was happening. Beverley Finnegan thought her new house was collapsing:

FINNEGAN ACT: I woke up to a noise and felt the house shake and heard the cracks in the wall, and it felt like the roof was falling in. But it was the loud rumble which was really really loud like a train.

STURDEY: One street has been evacuated in Gainsborough in Lincolnshire because of falling chimney stacks. And an elderly man in Barnsley in South Yorkshire has been taken to hospital with leg injuries after a chimney fell through his bedroom ceiling.

Drug users who drop out of treatment programmes could lose their benefits, under Government proposals being published this morning. A new ten year strategy to tackle drugs in England and Wales will also encourage grandparents to care for the children of addicts and provide better treatment for women and people from ethnic minorities. Here's our Home Editor, Mark Easton:

EASTON: Among the new proposals in the strategy are measures to seize the assets of drug dealers on arrest rather than charge, and proposals to withdraw benefits from problem users who don't complete treatment programmes. But such ideas are already being dismissed as unworkable gimmicks, with critics arguing the real focus should be on the tens of billions of pounds due to be spent on the actual treatment itself over the next decade. National targets will still be based on numbers signed up for treatment rather than the effectiveness of treatment. There's been debate within the drugs arena as to whether more emphasis should be placed on getting problem off drugs -- currently only three per cent leave the scheme free of all illegal drugs. There's also concern that a focus on punishment and enforced treatment fails to encourage programmes to reduce the harm caused by drugs.

The Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith, told this programme that drug treatments had become available and far more effective. But she recognised that it could take up to seven years for addicts to become completely drug free:

SMITH ACT: I think the aim of drug treatment should be to get people off drugs, it should also be to reduce the harm that drug-use causes to their families and to their communities. For example, I am completely intolerant of people dealing drugs and causing anti-social behaviour and crime in local neighbourhoods. That's precisely why we have said we want the police to use the powers that they have. We have closed a thousand crack-houses and we need to make sure we keep doing that.

The two main rivals seeking to become the Democratic party candidate in the American presidential election have each accused the other of misrepresenting their views. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton met in a public debate at Cleveland -- their last encounter before primary contests in Ohio and Texas that could settle who wins the nomination. Our North America editor, Justin Webb, is in Ohio:

WEBB: In the spin room where the candidates' representatives come to claim success, the mood after the debate is subdued. The truth is that these two candidates have made their cases in numerous encounters. There is little else to say. Mrs Clinton made some strong points about her health care plan:

CLINTON ACT: It's been unfortunate that Senator Obama has consistently said that I would force people to have health care whether they could afford it or not. We should have a good debate that uses accurate information, not false misleading and discredited information.

WEBB: In return, Senator Obama claimed again that Mrs Clinton made an error of judgement in voting to give permission for the Iraq war. So what happens now? All seems to hinge on Texas and Ohio next Tuesday. If Mrs Clinton loses those primaries, it's difficult to see her carrying on and yet Mark Penn, Senator Clinton's chief strategist, told me that's exactly what she'd do, all the way to the convention, he said. That thought for Democrats who want to unite around a nominee is very worrying.

Two British men are going to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg this morning in an effort to get their DNA removed from the UK national police database. They've never been convicted of a criminal offence. The police insist that the database has helped them catch some of the country's most notorious killers. Here's Dominic Hughes:

HUGHES: The convictions of killers Steven Wright and Mark Dixie owed much to the police DNA database -- both were caught after samples taken from them in connection with other crimes were matched with those found on the bodies of their victims. But now, two innocent men are taking their case to the European Court of Human Rights to get their DNA and fingerprints removed from police records. Both were arrested and so lawfully had DNA samples taken. But they were later cleared and their lawyers will argue that keeping the information infringes their right to privacy and anti discrimination laws. If successful, tens of thousands of similar DNA records will have to be destroyed. Information in previous cases has proved vital in securing convictions.

The Information Tribunal has ruled that details of expenses claims made by MPs' for their second homes can be made public. Responding to a three year Freedom of Information campaign, it ruled that the allowance of up to 23 thousand pounds a year was open to misuse. The House of Commons authorities -- who say the move would threaten MPs' privacy -- now have 28 days to appeal against the ruling.

Jersey police say they hope to resume digging this morning at the site of the former children's home where human remains were found at the weekend. They are focussing their search on a blocked up cellar. The chief of Jersey police, Graham Power, said several witnesses had provided information which suggested the cellar was an important part of the inquiry:

POWER ACT: They describe being held in the cellar, they describe sexual offences occurring and being physically and sexually abused. We need to make sure that we found the right cellar, we need to see if there is any evidence which would support what they're saying, we need to find a way of getting in and out safely, which we haven't done yet, and we need to explore the other locations.

Greenpeace, the RSPB and the National Grid are among more than two dozen organisations joining forces to encourage people to switch off their electrical items for the good of the planet. They're all taking part in the UK's first Energy Saving Day, which will be launched this afternoon.

The number of people treated for dog bites at hospitals in England has increased by forty per cent during the past four years. The Liberal Democrats obtained the figures after a series of high profile attacks in which young children have been seriously injured by dogs. Our health correspondent Branwen Jeffries reports:

JEFFRIES: Almost four thousand people went to hospital last year after being bitten by a dog. Young children and teenagers are most likely to be treated for a dog attack and there are strong regional variations. Figures for patients under eighteen show an eighty increase in the West Midland and more than a hundred per cent in London during the four years. The Liberal Democrat health spokesman, Norman Lamb, says there's a worrying trend in some areas of dangerous dogs being used as fashion accessories. The Government says two existing laws allow any dangerous dogs to be destroyed and their owners to face criminal charges.

A TV advertisement for Nutella has been withdrawn because of complaints that it exaggerated the product's nutritional value. The advert made claims about the chocolate hazelnut spread's contribution to a balanced breakfast. The manufacturer, Ferrero UK, says it didn't set out to mislead.

A notice of sale has been issued on Michael Jackson's Neverland ranch in California. A spokesman for Santa Barbara County said the star had fallen behind in repayments and the estate would be auctioned next month unless he paid more than twelve-million pounds he still owed on the property.